Mass customization of teaching and learning in organizations

In search of methods that improve the efficiency of teaching and training in organizations, several authors point out that mass customization (MC) is a principle that covers individual needs of knowledge and skills and, at the same time, limits the development costs of customized training to those of mass training. MC is proven and established in the economic sector, and shows high potential for continuing education, too. The paper explores this potential and proposes a multidisciplinary, pragmatic approach to teaching and training in organizations. The first section of the paper formulates four design principles of MC deduced from an examination of economics literature. The second section presents amit™, a frame for mass customized training, designed according to the principles presented in the first section. The evaluation results encourage the further development and use of mass customized training in continuing education, and offer suggestions for future research

A generic architecture for interactive intelligent tutoring systems

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University, 07/06/2001.This research is focused on developing a generic intelligent architecture for an interactive tutoring system. A review of the literature in the areas of instructional theories, cognitive and social views of learning, intelligent tutoring systems development methodologies, and knowledge representation methods was conducted. As a result, a generic ITS development architecture (GeNisa) has been proposed, which combines the features of knowledge base systems (KBS) with object-oriented methodology. The GeNisa architecture consists of the following components: a tutorial events communication module, which encapsulates the interactive processes and other independent computations between different components; a software design toolkit; and an autonomous knowledge acquisition from a probabilistic knowledge base. A graphical application development environment includes tools to support application development, and learning environments and which use a case scenario as a basis for instruction. The generic architecture is designed to support client-side execution in a Web browser environment, and further testing will show that it can disseminate applications over the World Wide Web. Such an architecture can be adapted to different teaching styles and domains, and reusing instructional materials automatically can reduce the effort of the courseware developer (hence cost and time) in authoring new materials. GeNisa was implemented using Java scripts, and subsequently evaluated at various commercial and academic organisations. Parameters chosen for the evaluation include quality of courseware, relevancy of case scenarios, portability to other platforms, ease of use, content, user-friendliness, screen display, clarity, topic interest, and overall satisfaction with GeNisa. In general, the evaluation focused on the novel characteristics and performances of the GeNisa architecture in comparison with other ITS and the results obtained are discussed and analysed. On the basis of the experience gained during the literature research and GeNisa development and evaluation. a generic methodology for ITS development is proposed as well as the requirements for the further development of ITS tools. Finally, conclusions are drawn and areas for further research are identified

A pedagogical design pattern framework:for sharing experiences and enhancing communities of practice within online and blended learning

”Design patterns” were originally proposed in architecture and later in software engineering as a methodology to sketch and share solutions to recurring design problems. In recent years ”pedagogical design patterns” have been introduced as a way to sketch and share good practices in teaching and learning; specifically in the context of technology-enhanced learning (e-learning). Several attempts have been made to establish a framework for describing and sharing such e-learning patterns, but so far they have had limited success. At a series of workshops in a competence-development project for teachers at the University of Copenhagen a new and simpler pedagogical design pattern framework was developed for interfaculty sharing of experiences and enhancing communities of practice in relation to online and blended learning across the university. In this study, the new pedagogical design pattern framework is applied to describe the learning design in four online and blended learning courses within different academic disciplines: Classical Greek, Biostatistics, Environmental Management in Europe, and Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation. Future perspectives for using the framework for developing new E-learning patterns for online and blended learning courses are discussed

Gradually learning programming supported by a growable programming language

Learning programming is a difficult task. The learning process is particularly disorienting when you are approaching programming for the first time. As a student you are exposed to several new concepts (control flow, variable, etc. but also coding, compiling etc.) and new ways to think (algorithms). Teachers try to expose the students gradually to the new concepts by presenting them one by one but the tools at student's disposal do not help: they provide support, suggestion and documentation for the full programming language of choice hampering the teacher's efforts. On the other side, students need to learn real languages and not didactic languages. In this work we propose an approach to gradually teaching programming supported by a programming language that grows---together with its implementation---along with the number of concepts presented to the students. The proposed approach can be applied to the teaching of any programming language and some experiments with Javascript are reported

Experts on e-learning: insights gained from listening to the student voice!

The Student Experience of e-Learning Laboratory (SEEL) project at the University of Greenwich was designed to explore and then implement a number of approaches to investigate learners’ experiences of using technology to support their learning. In this paper members of the SEEL team present initial findings from a University-wide survey of nearly a 1000 students. A selection of 90 ‘cameos’, drawn from the survey data, offer further insights into personal perceptions of e-learning and illustrate the diversity of students experiences. The cameos provide a more coherent picture of individual student experience based on the totality of each person’s responses to the questionnaire. Finally, extracts from follow-up case studies, based on interviews with a small number of students, allow us to ‘hear’ the student voice more clearly. Issues arising from an analysis of the data include student preferences for communication and social networking tools, views on the ‘smartness’ of their tutors’ uses of technology and perceptions of the value of e-learning. A primary finding and the focus of this paper, is that students effectively arrive at their own individualised selection, configuration and use of technologies and software that meets their perceived needs. This ‘personalisation’ does not imply that such configurations are the most efficient, nor does it automatically suggest that effective learning is occurring. SEEL reminds us that learners are individuals, who approach learning both with and without technology in their own distinctive ways. Hearing, understanding and responding to the student voice is fundamental in maximising learning effectiveness. Institutions should consider actively developing the capacity of academic staff to advise students on the usefulness of particular online tools and resources in support of learning and consider the potential benefits of building on what students already use in their everyday lives. Given the widespread perception that students tend to be ‘digital natives’ and academic staff ‘digital immigrants’ (Prensky, 2001), this could represent a considerable cultural challenge

Adaptive games for learner and systems (bidirectional) learning

Thesis (PhD)--Stellenbosch University, 2022.ENGLISH ABSTRACT:Traditional learning environments are ineffective and inefficient and are failing to adequately equip students and employees with the knowledge and skills required in today’s jobs, let alone prepare them for the jobs of tomorrow. Given the rapidly changing landscapes of technologies and business models, organisations need to be flexible and adaptable to respond to, and even pre-empt future demands. One of the primary shortcomings of existing learning environments is their inflexibility and the ‘one size fits all’ approach followed. Serious games and game-based learning are widely recognised for their potential in providing more effective learning environments, especially when designed in a personalised, adaptive manner, and are explored in this dissertation. In addition to adapting to the individual traits and preferences of users, games are also highly context dependent. Whilst there is a great deal of literature and documented case studies of game-based learning, most focus only on the implementation of one particular game in a specific context. Whilst many existing game design models and approaches focus on achieving improved learning outcomes of learners, there is an opportunity to consider the impact of gameplay on other stakeholders and drive the active development of meta-skills in various stakeholders. Bidirectional learning, where learning simultaneously takes place in a two-way direction [295], has great potential and has, to date, not been incorporated in serious game design. By integrating different perspectives and variable scenarios, the dynamic personalisation of learning trajectories may be possible. Serious games offer a potential platform to aggregate learner behaviours and results, and use these to dynamically configure, adjust and tailor the game to individuals and contexts, ultimately providing a learning environment of improved quality, effectiveness and efficiency. In this dissertation, adaptive, bidirectional games are explored as a means to provide more effective and efficient learning environments for multiple stakeholders. Moreover, an architecture is presented to support the creation of such games for specific scenarios in a faster, more effective and more efficient manner. Following a research-by-design approach, the architecture is iteratively developed and simultaneously applied in four case studies. Experiences and learnings from each case study are infused into subsequent design iterations of the architecture. The architecture allows users to explore and exploit the solution space more deliberately and better understand the various functions and the interrelations between them. The flexible and modular structure of the architecture allows users to prioritise functionalities as required in the given scenario. Furthermore, the directional relations between functions can be interpreted and prioritised as needed given the specific context and requirements. The architecture incorporates various stakeholders in the design process, leading to greater transparency and better understanding throughout the process. More importantly, it emphasises bidirectional learning whereby different stakeholders can learn from gameplay and the aggregated results and behaviours of players.AFRIKAANS OPSOMMING: Tradisionele leeromgewings is oneffektief en ondoeltreffend en slaag nie daarin om studente en werknemers voldoende toe te rus met die kennis en vaardighede wat in die huidige werk benodig is nie, en nog minder vir toekomstige werk. Gegewe die vinnig veranderende landskappe van tegnologie¨e en sakemodelle, moet organisasies buigsaam en aanpasbaar wees om te reageer op, en selfs toekomstige behoeftes te voorkom. Een van die belangrikste tekortkominge van bestaande leeromgewings is die onbuigsaamheid daarvan asook die ‘een grootte pas almal’ benadering wat gevolg word. Ernstige speletjies en spelgebaseerde leer word oor die algemeen erken vir hul potensiaal om meer effektiewe leeromgewings te skep, veral as dit op ’n persoonlike, aanpasbare manier ontwerp is, en word in hierdie proefskrif ondersoek. Benewens die aanpassing by die individuele eienskappe en voorkeure van gebruikers, is speletjies ook baie kontekstafhanklik. Alhoewel daar baie literatuur en gedokumenteerde gevallestudies oor spelgebaseerde leer is, fokus die meeste daarvan slegs op die implementering van een spesifieke spel in ’n spesifieke konteks. Alhoewel baie bestaande spelontwerpmodelle en -benaderings op die verbeterde leeruitkomste van leerders focus, is daar ’n geleentheid om die impak van spel op ander belanghebbendes te oorweeg en die aktiewe ontwikkeling van metavaardighede by verskeie belanghebbendes te dryf. Tweerigtingleer, waar leer gelyktydig in twee rigtinge plaasvind [295], het ’n groot potensiaal en is huidig nog nie in ernstige spelontwerp opgeneem nie. Deur die integrasie van verskillende perspektiewe en veranderlike scenario’s, word die dinamiese personalisering van leertrajekte moontlik. Ernstige speletjies bied ’n moontlike platform om leerdergedrag en -resultate saam te voeg, en dit te gebruik om die spel dinamies te konfigureer en aan te pas by individue en kontekste, wat ’n leeromgewing van verbeterde kwaliteit, effektiwiteit en doeltreffendheid bied. In hierdie proefskrif word aanpasbare, tweerigting speletjies ondersoek as ’n manier om meer effektiewe en doeltreffende leeromgewings vir verskeie belanghebbendes te bied. Boonop word ’n argitektuur aangebied om die skep van sulke speletjies vir spesifieke scenario’s vinniger, meer effektief en doeltreffender te ondersteun. Na aanleiding van ’n navorsing-deur-ontwerp benadering word die argitektuur iteratief ontwikkel en gelyktydig toegepas in vier gevallestudies. Ervarings en leerstellings uit elke gevallestudie word ingesluit in die daaropvolgende ontwerp iterasies van die argitektuur. Met die argitektuur kan gebruikers die oplossingsruimte doelbewus ondersoek en benut, en die verskillende funksies en onderlinge verwantskappe tussen hulle beter verstaan. Die buigsame en modulˆere struktuur van die argitektuur stel gebruikers in staat om funksionaliteite te prioritiseer soos vereis in die gegewe scenario. Verder kan die rigtingverhoudinge tussen funksies ge¨ınterpreteer en geprioritiseer word soos benodig, gegewe die spesifieke konteks en vereistes. Die argitektuur bevat verskillende belanghebbendes in die ontwerpproses, wat lei tot verbeterde deursigtigheid en begrip gedurende die proses. Belangriker nog, dit beklemtoon tweerigtingleer waardeur verskillende belanghebbendes kan leer deur die spel en die saamgestelde resultate en gedrag van spelers.Doctora